Doubts cast on Russian 'rejection' of Kyoto Protocol

By BRIAN FALLOW


Russia cannot ratify the Kyoto Protocol because it would seriously limit its economic growth, presidential adviser Andrei Illarionov said yesterday.

Since the protocol will only come into force and be legally binding on the countries that have ratified if Russia also signs, the comments were initially reported as delivering the coup de grace to the global warming treaty.

But an American expert on climate change policy, Professor Henry Jacoby, said that conclusion was premature.

"He [Illarionov] has said this before in September and it is not clear this is a statement by the Russian Government. I suspect it is high-level, bare-knuckle negotiating with Europe."

Jacoby, an economist who heads the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's joint programme on the science and policy of climate change, was in Wellington to visit the Motu think-tank.

He cited Winston Churchill's observation in another context: "I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma."

Jacoby guessed that Russia would ratify within two years. "But I wouldn't bet my car on it - it's maybe a 60:40 proposition."

Under Kyoto's rules, Russia, like New Zealand but on a much larger scale, would be a seller of carbon credits - tradeable rights to emit greenhouse gases - on the international market.

Many Russian smokestacks have gone cold with the collapse of the Soviet economy. Its emissions have dropped nearly a third since 1990, Kyoto's year zero, and would have to rise 50 per cent over the next decade before it risked exceeding its quota.

The gap between Russia's actual emissions and its Kyoto allowance is likely to be big enough to make it the dominant seller of carbon credits.

But Russia is the world's second-largest oil exporter and a big exporter of natural gas. That creates an influential anti-Kyoto constituency, arguing that a treaty intended to be a first step towards weaning the world off fossil fuels is not in Russia's long-term interests.

Agence France Presse reports that some Russian officials have hinted at making ratification conditional on European acceptance of Russia's application to join the World Trade Organisation.

Others have pointed to the timing of Illarionov's comments, which came days before both elections to the Russian Duma and a conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which the Kyoto Protocol attempts to give some teeth to.

The head of the World Wildlife Fund's climate change programme in Russia, Alexei Kokorin, said Illarionov's statement did not hold any weight as to what Russia would actually do.

"Illarionov does not speak for the President or the Russian Government," said Kokorin, citing previous policy predictions the adviser had made that had failed to eventuate.

Kyoto Protocol

* Legally binding agreement created at conference of more than 160 nations in Kyoto, Japan, December 1997.

* Sets targets to limit emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, and sulphur dioxide.

* Requires ratification by countries accounting for at least 55pc of the total 1990 emissions before it comes into force.

* To date, 120 countries have ratified, accounting for 44pc of emissions.

* Australia, Russia and United States are yet to ratify.